Yes, thank you.
The costs really depend on what province you live in. In Ontario, for example, if you were to get a private home study done, it might cost you $1,500 or $2,000, and the same for taking the mandatory pre-service training, which in Ontario is called P.R.I.D.E training.
Because the tax credit is only 15% of the total, up to a maximum, when you claim the tax credit you want to be able to pile all of your expenses together to get the maximum benefit. The changes better allow families to do that. Previously, if you had a home study done two or three years before you actually had a child placed with you, you couldn't claim that expense because it had to be done in the year the adoption was finalized. You couldn't pile up those expenses together, if they were done over several years.
It's a very small change, but we hope it will help with some of those costs and, again, make it a little bit easier for families and encourage some who might be on the fence about whether they can afford it or not.
If you adopt directly through the public system, you can do it without cost, really. When I adopted in Ontario, it really didn't cost me anything because the Children's Aid Society conducted my home study, and I went through training there. But if families are trying to get adoption-ready, which many of them are doing, they get their private home study done first, they go through the training, and then they present themselves. If you're adopting internationally, of course, it can be even more expensive, costing some $20,000 to $40,000.